Civil Warfare

To the fracture within me that likes to write things—

You’re the liar.
You treat me like some useless peasant who doesn’t matter.
You act like you’re the better version of me that gets to speak for me.
You know what?

Fuck you.

I’m not cleaning this up.
I won’t use metaphors just to make it easier to swallow for those people you claim not to care about.

This is me as I am. Not how you’d prefer me to be. Not your basis for acceptance.

Look away if you must—fore I am a full-blown nigga. Proud of it. I say that with my full chest.
Country when I want to be.
Broken English.
Honestly? Too wise for most rooms and tired of proving it.

Sometimes I write things that make you question reality itself.
Sometimes I tell jokes so dark you forget I’m some computer science dork.
Sometimes, I am the joke.

But I always know when I’m playing—and I damn sure know when I’m not.

You don’t get to define me by the mask I chose to wear that day.
You don’t get to decide if I’m palatable, professional, articulate, radical, lazy, spiritual, dangerous, genius, unhinged, or safe.

You’re right about something, though.
I’m none of them.
Because I’m all of them.
I’m me—and that shifts moment to moment, by choice, not chance.

I exist in rooms I wasn’t invited into and don’t need your permission to stay.
I switch code.
I speak grief.
I pontificate about quantum mechanics in southern slang within the same thought.

I hear the warning about the Lie in your voice before I even finish the sentence.
And I don’t care.
I Lie anyway.

I don’t need your feedback.
I don’t need your judgment.
I don’t even need your understanding.

But since you’re here, let me make one thing clear to you, nigga:

This world was built on a Lie.
A big, polished, well-funded, multi-generational Lie.
And, yes, I know it.

I’m done listening to you talk about how I don’t see you.

So when you see me laughing, working, building, lying, joking—playing along with the other losers of reality—
understand this:

I am not asleep.
I am not awake.

I am not what you think I am.
Not exactly.

I see the Lie, and I’m moving straight through it.

And if you try to force me into a side, a lane, a label, a role, or a back seat to you—
I’ll choose none.
Just like you did.

And keep it moving, right past you and the Lie.

I am the flow of whatever the fuck I want to be.

Drown in my “motion.”

I am Somebody.

And I declare war.